AI API Cost Calculator
≈ 4,000 chars
≈ 2,000 chars
3,000 / month · 36,500 / year
$3/M in · $15/M out · 1000k ctx
Medium cost — $1.05 / day
Input cost
$0.00300
3/M tokens
Output cost
$0.00750
15/M tokens
Total cost
$0.0105
1,500 total tokens
Daily
$1.05
100 requests
Monthly (30 days)
$31.50
30 days
Annual
$383
365 days
Prices are per 1M tokens (2025 list pricing). Costs may vary with volume discounts, caching, or promotions. Verify current rates on provider websites.
About
The AI Cost Calculator computes exact API costs for 11 major language models using current July 2026 pricing. Enter your expected input tokens, output tokens, and requests per day to see per-request, daily, monthly, and annual cost breakdowns. The "Compare all models" table sorts all models by monthly cost so you can instantly find the most cost-effective option for your use case. All calculations are done client-side with no API calls.
How to use
- 1 Select a model from the dropdown — models are grouped by provider.
- 2 Enter the average number of input tokens per request (your prompt length).
- 3 Enter the average number of output tokens per request (model response length).
- 4 Enter how many requests per day you expect to make.
- 5 Cost cards update instantly — per request, daily, monthly, and annual.
- 6 Click "Compare all models" to see a full table sorted by monthly cost.
- How are token costs calculated?
- Cost = (input_tokens × input_price_per_token) + (output_tokens × output_price_per_token). Prices are per million tokens. For example, Claude Opus 4.8 costs $5 per million input tokens and $25 per million output tokens. Multiply by requests/day × 30 to get monthly cost.
- Why are input and output tokens priced differently?
- Processing input (reading context) is computationally cheaper than generating output. Output tokens require autoregressive generation — each new token is predicted one at a time — so they cost 2-6× more than input tokens across most providers.
- How can I reduce my LLM API costs?
- Use a smaller/cheaper model for simpler tasks (Claude Haiku, Gemini Flash, DeepSeek V4 Flash). Cache repeated prompts with provider prompt-caching features. Reduce system prompt length. Limit max_tokens. Use streaming to detect and stop early. Batch requests where possible.
- Are the prices up to date?
- Prices reflect published rates as of July 2026. Note that some providers charge premium rates above a long-context threshold (e.g. GPT-5.x doubles input pricing past 272K tokens); the calculator uses standard rates. LLM pricing changes frequently — always verify current rates on the provider's official pricing page before making budget decisions.